Carnegie Mellon University and the Your Move program

Making Healthy Decisions is a randomized controlled trial led by Dr. Julie Downs at Carnegie Mellon University and Dr. Pamela Murray at West Virginia University and funded by the Office of Adolescent Health (TP2AH000027). Making Healthy Decisions is evaluating Your Move, a sex education intervention, in comparison to Eat Smart, a nutrition education intervention. Both curricula incorporate technology and interactive video, and both empower young women to make healthier choices about either sex or nutrition. The program is delivered to groups of girls ages 14-19. Each group is randomly assigned to one of the two programs. Both Your Move and Eat Smart consist of seven 75-minute sessions, each session including 60 minutes of facilitator-led group activities and 15 minutes of interactive videos on personal tablets.

Your Move incorporates interactive video from Drs. Downs’ and Murray’s evidence-based intervention, Seventeen Days, along with activities, games, and a facilitator-led curriculum developed by the Center for Sex Education. The program teaches young women to make active, informed decisions about sex and contraception, and gives them opportunities to practice these decisions in advance. The program sessions cover decision making, talking about sex, sexual readiness, condoms and other types of contraception, STIs, and planning for the future. Your Move aims to improve healthy sexual decision making in young women and is currently under evaluation as part of the Making Healthy Decisions study.

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Mary GreenfieldSexuality Education Consultant

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